Kryptonite
by bookaddict209
Summary: John and Sherlock are trying to decide on their next case when when the perfect one crosses their threshold and claims to be Sherlock's daughter. She doesn't want much, just her emancipation. One question- why does Sherlock say no? (Hint: it's not what you think)
1. Chapter 1

**Just a little something I've been thinking about that I had to get out. I've written enough of this already to have it update pretty regularly. Let me know what you think!**

Tensions at 221B had been running on the high side lately. The cases had been pouring in, but the detective had refused to take on any of them, deeming them unworthy of his attention. John didn't understand Sherlock's rationale. If the entire point of solving cases was to _distract _himself, what should the caliber of the case matter? He could solve a quick succession of cases to distract himself if he needed to.

John just needed him to _get out of the apartment._ He'd walked inside the day before and was greeted with Sherlock sitting in his chair with his hands steepled under his chin, staring at the eviscerated pig intestines he'd smeared all over the floor. Sherlock was coated in blood from head to toe; it was even under his fingernails. John had been shocked and disgusted with the whole scene, but the nail in the coffin had come when John realized Sherlock was wearing one of John's favorite jumpers over his suit.

He'd been so galled at the sight of his jumper covered in blood that he swore with a ferocity that had made Ms. Hudson come up the stairs and shut the door. He'd told Sherlock that if he didn't choose a case to occupy himself before the next day, John would stop helping Sherlock on cases permanently.

John pulled the kettle off the stove and poured it into his mug. He stifled a yawn as he looked out into the living room at Sherlock. He didn't think Sherlock had slept at all last night, even after the exhausting task of cleaning up all the pig's blood. John had passed out at three in the morning and was practically dead on his feet. The man was a machine, plain and simple.

Said machine was standing in the corner of the room in his robe, eyes roving over the walls. Printouts of the different available cases were tacked to it; he was trying to pick one. He'd been there since the night before, in the exact same spot. John really hoped he picked one soon.

"Come on, does it _really_ matter who's case you take on?" he finally demanded after twenty minutes of silence.

"It has to be a good one," Sherlock shot back. "Nothing so ordinary. I'm bored, John, and I need a case to entice me."

"Are there any good ones on the board?"

Sherlock's hand pointed to a few of the papers. "Killings that seem to follow the pattern laid out in the plot of old puppet shows. People falling asleep in their beds only to wake up driving cars. Man buried his wife two months ago and is convinced that she's not only come back, but is also stalking him."

"Great," deadpanned the doctor. "Then pick one and let's go. You've been there since last night. It's not that difficult."

"It's not about _a_ case, John, it's _the_ case. Lately everything we've been taking on have started to blend. They're all the same. I need the case that breaks the pattern; a case to _baffle_ me." John rolled his eyes at Sherlock's dramatics. _Just pick a damn case already_, he thought. It wasn't worth all the angst.

"Sherlock, dear," Ms. Hudson called up the stairs. "There's a young woman here for you."

His hawkish eyes snapped forward in excitement. "Do we have a client?"

"Not sure about that," she told him, climbing the stairs. "Seems a bit young to have a case."

A second set of lithe footsteps followed Ms. Hudson's, bring Sherlock's attention to the young woman. Ms. Hudson retreated back to her flat. The girl stepped into the flat and smiled at him. "Are you Sherlock Holmes?" she asked, her voice indicative of a Scottish accent.

She was a teenager, about sixteen or seventeen. Long black hair, blue eyes, dimple on the left when she smiled. She wore a threadbare striped jacket over a red cotton t-shirt that had a wilting lily painted onto it. Her jeans were too big for her, swallowing her willowy frame and billowing around her feet. She wore Oxfords.

Sherlock's mind did what it did best.

_Oxfords; clearly dressed for comfort. _

_T-shirt is hand painted, perhaps a gift, more likely done herself. Artistic, judging from the callouses on her fingers and spots of paint on the jeans. _

_Frugal with money spent on clothing- that jacket is clearly too small and too old to be of much use. Sentimental? _

_Scottish accent gathered from time spent in Scotland, but not native. _

_Extreme sun exposure. _

_Fond of rabbits. Recently came to London. Alone. Intelligent. Calculating. Sexually active. _

He snapped out of his whirlwind of deductions to give a mirthless grin to the girl. "I am. Come in."

She stepped inside and ran her eyes over the flat in a very Sherlock-esque sort of way. Very quickly she noticed John in the kitchen. He gave a slight wave. "John Watson."

She grinned. "I know. I've read your blog."

Sherlock stepped across the room and gestured to the chair across from him. To his surprise, the girl shook her head. "If it's all the same to you, Mr. Holmes, I'll stand. I doubt this will take very long."

_Odd_, thought Sherlock. Regardless of how long she imagined it would take, who would refuse a chair to stand?

"You have a case for us, then?" John asked, wandering into the room with his tea.

The girl smirked. "Three months ago I had a case. This is simply a means to an end." John had no idea what that meant, and he wasn't yet awake enough to care.

Both men sat and the girl stood between them. She ran her eyes over both of them, opened her mouth to speak, and then closed it with a smile and a sigh.

"I'm not quite sure where to begin," she admitted. "The situation is quite bizarre, and there's a good chance you won't believe me."

Already Sherlock was beginning to become both impatient and excited. "Don't waste my time with nonsense. Be succinct; _don't_ be boring."

She didn't care for his attitude. Her eyes narrowed ever so slightly and she smirked. "The short version then? Lovely."

She reached into her bag and rummaged around before pulling out a sealed manila folder. She held it out to Sherlock and said, "My name is Jacqueline Piper, but everyone calls me Jack. And according to my birth certificate, you are my biological father."

Silence fell over the flat.

Sherlock blinked.

He blinked again.

Then he took the folder out of Jack's hands and slowly inspected the contents. He'd been right about her accent- she hadn't been born in Scotland. Her birth certificate stated that she had been born here in the heart of London, to a Mary-Lynn Piper and one Mr. Sherlock Holmes.

"You're..." he trailed off. He couldn't think of a single thing to say. John sat on the couch, so shocked at the news that he'd almost dropped his tea.

Jack laughed at his puzzled expression. "Oh, it gets better, Mr. Holmes. I'm filing a petition against the city of London for my immediate emancipation. I need either both parents' signatures, both parents' death certificates, or a combination of the two. Mum is _quite_ dead, so that just leaves your signature."

She pulled more papers out of her bag and handed them to him. His eyes roved over them and discovered that they were indeed emancipation forms, marked with large X's where he needed to sign his name. He still couldn't think of a single thing to say.

"_Succinct_ enough for you?" Jack asked with a smirk and crossed arms.

"Are you serious? Your _daughter_? How is that possible? I thought you were..." John trailed off, immediately aware of how inappropriate this conversation was.

"I am." Sherlock looked up at her. "This is not possible. I can assure you that I've never had physical relations with a woman. "

"You may not have ever had sex, but you've certainly, er, _donated your time _before," Jack said delicately.

"What does that mean?" John asked.

Sherlock breath a sharp intake. "Oh my. Oh _no_."

"What?"

"Sperm, John. I donated my sperm a long time ago."

John was absolutely shocked. He couldn't even begin to conceive of Sherlock _donating his time_. "Oh, God, why?"

"I was doing an experiment," he said, his eyes looking inwards as he regressed. "The sperm bank was adamant against letting me use their lab in the beginning, but they eventually agreed to let me use their equipment in exchange for...a donation."

Silence bounced around the room. Nobody could think of anything to say. Jack swayed on the balls of her feet awkwardly. She hadn't meant to make the man this upset, and while it was funny, it wasn't getting her close to a signature. "So..."

Sherlock looked at the girl again and surveyed her from head to toe. A daughter? He had a _daughter_?

Well. He _did_ say he wanted to be baffled.


	2. Chapter 2

Here's chapter 2. Whoop!  
PS- a few things will be out of order, and just for the sake of now, I've repurposed John's first day with Sherlock and given it to Jack. But don't worry, the missions will be more original later!

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The first thing he did, obviously, was call Molly at St. Barts and have her prepare a paternity test. He wouldn't simply take the girl's word for it; papers could easily be forged. He needed science to tell him what he uneasily suspected.

Sherlock and John raced around in their rooms, throwing on clothes and running through the necessary morning preparations at warp speed. Jack waited patiently in their living room, tapping on her phone, still not sitting. Sherlock noted before he darted from the room that it was cutting edge, a state of the art model that had only come out weeks before. _Money saved on clothes is spent on electronics._

The two men re-entered the living room, both staring at Jack. "Well... come along, then," Sherlock said, clearing his throat and wrapping his scarf around his neck. John waited until Jack had walked out to follow behind so he could study the girl. She was on the short side for a girl her age. Her hair was a dark brown-but-not-quite-black color, down over her shoulders.

She wrapped her arms tight against her chest when they stepped outside to shield herself from the cold. John wondered briefly why she didn't wear a thicker coat. Sherlock tried to hail a taxi.

"Mind telling me where we're going?" she demanded.

"St. Barts, a lab I frequent when I have cases. I need to perform a paternity test," Sherlock informed.

She rolled her eyes. "Really? You think I would lie about being your daughter only to _then _ask for my emancipation?"

"I think it's entirely possible," was his flat reply.

"Oh, come now. Balance of probability."

Sherlock faltered in his step at the familiar words and whirled on Jack. "What did you just say?"

She rolled her eyes again. Sherlock already didn't care for the habit. "I read your book _years_ ago. Besides, don't you think I Googled you?"

He blinked at her before shaking his head and hailing a cab, properly this time. The trio climbed in and the cab set off for the lab.

0-0-0-0-0-0

Sherlock burst through the doors in his usual bombastic way with a force that made Molly jump. "I did what you asked and had the kit brought down and assembled for you," she said nervously. "I'm not really sure I heard you right, Sherlock, you said something about a daughter...?"

She peeked around Sherlock's towering frame and noticed the teenager huddled in the corner of the room. The girl looked up and smiled. "Jack Piper. Hello."

Molly nodded in a daze before wandering to the other side of the table. Sherlock tossed his winter wear to the side. He put Jack's birth certificate and emancipation papers off to the side of the table and began rummaging through the different components of the kit. John awkwardly stood on the other side of the table and watched, feeling quite useless. Molly, still slightly confused at what was going on, glanced down at her birth certificate. She read more closely and her eyebrows puckered in amazement.

"You're _fifteen_?" she asked incredulously. Sherlock's head snapped up. Even John looked surprised.

Jack laughed at the befuddled expressions. "I know. I'm tall."

Molly's eyes uneasily glanced at Jack's chest. Tall wasn't the word she would use.

John, meanwhile, was slightly worried about his friend. Sherlock was doing that thing where he became extra-analytical and cold when he was freaked out on the inside. "Sherlock, what is it you're doing?"

"Paternity test. DNA can be studied for similarities and patterns between the father and the offspring. I need to check and see if our DNA is at all similar. If it is, I need to know everything about how this happened and contact that sperm bank and demand that my specimens be destroyed immediately. Spit into this."

That last comment was directed at Jack, who was standing over in the corner looking at call sheets. Anything to distract herself from the cold, antiseptic mood of the room. Hospitals and hospital-like places made her uneasy. When she looked up, Sherlock was holding out a small jar to her.

"I'm sorry?" she asked.

"Normally I'm supposed to swab your cheek, but the strands of DNA extracted from such a small sample could take days to evaluate, and I'd much rather get this settled today. Spit. In here."

Jack warily took the vial and, red-cheeked, turned her back on the room. Her shoulders convulsed as she made a small 'ptoie' noise. John chuckled. It was kind of cute.

Sherlock did the same in a much less dignified way and accepted Jack's, labeling them both and pulling a microscope closer to him. He had just powered it up when the door opened.

DI Lestrade walked in and sighed. "Finally. Been looking for you everywhere."

On any other day, Sherlock would've already been out the door and into a car, but he was a little busy at the moment. "No."

Lestrade straightened up. "You don't even know-"

"Doesn't matter. I'm busy."

"But it's a murder."

Dammit. He could use one right now. "Busy."

"It's part of the serial suicides," he tried again.

"_Busy_."

"There's been a fourth. She left us a _note_."

The consulting detective in him shivered with delight. They _never_ left notes. He reluctantly pulled away from the microscope and pushed everything toward Molly. "Take this where it needs to go and have it evaluated. Call me by the end of the day with the results."

He grabbed his coat and scarf, donning them while ignoring Molly's weak protests that she had other work to do and leaving the room. John gestured to Jack and the two of them left as well.

They caught up with the pair of detectives as they walked outside. "Good to see you, John," Lestrade said. "You're looking...tired."

"I'm certainly not bored, I can tell you that."

Lestrade noticed Jack then. He'd seen her in the room but didn't know she was with Sherlock. "And who are you?"

She extended her hand. "Jack Piper. Hello."

Lestrade took it. "Hello. How do you know these guys?"

"Just met them this morning. My relationship with them is pending."

Lestrade nodded before realizing he had no idea what that meant. But at that point they were back outside, so he just shrugged and got in his car.

The four of them drove off down the street and Jack turned to face John. "You two never stay in one place long, do you?" she whispered.

"Yeah, get used to that."

"So where are we going now?"

"Crime scene," he answered. "There's a body Sherlock'll need to look at."

"Ah. Why am I going too?"

"If those tests come back positive, you and I will have much to discuss," Sherlock said, surprising both of them. "I'd rather not have to hunt around for you."

Lestrade looked in the rearview mirror. "Tests? What tests?"

"Paternity. Jacqueline may or may not be my child," he replied in a clipped voice. "I'm verifying."

"Call me Jack," she insisted.

"I don't approve of nicknames."

"Oh, like _John_ is a full name?"

Lestrade ogled the girl in the mirror. Sherlock, possibly the most un-human human he'd ever met, had a daughter? He respected the man greatly and appreciated his help, but when they got the crime scene Lestrade ran inside and told everyone within earshot. It was just that fucking funny.

Sherlock climbed out of the car and walked over the the police tape with his blogger and (potential) daughter behind him. Donovan and Anderson were at the edge of the sidewalk. Donovan was clearly guarding the perimeter, but it looked like Anderson had just come out to see the new topic of gossip. Sherlock noticed they were glaring at each other slightly when they arrived.

"They're waiting for you in there," Donovan said, both she and Anderson taking furtive glances at Jack. She gave them both a humorless smile. She hated being stared at.

Sherlock absorbed all their details and body language (coupled with the fact that they were three feet apart) and deduced that their affair was having a rough patch. He held his tongue, deciding to save his observation until one of them irritated him. He walked inside.

John and Jack followed. "What was up with those two?" John asked.

Sherlock looked back at him. "What do you mean?"

"They weren't being as...aggravating as usual," John said.

"Probably too consumed with their messy affair," Jack said with a smirk.

John raised his eyebrows and Sherlock stopped walking all together. "_What_?"

She rolled her eyes. It was the third time she'd done it in the past hour and Sherlock was seriously considering grabbing her head the next time she did it. "I told you, I read your book."

Sherlock raised an eyebrow, impressed. Jack could deduce after reading his book? Pride swelled in his chest that something he had produced (be it the girl or the book) had made the world a bit less stupid.

Sherlock and John walked into the room with the dead body, both of them pulling on latex gloves. Jack tried to stand just outside the doorway, but there was too much equipment and too many people; she was getting in the way. She went inside with trepidation and holed herself up in the corner. Hospitals gave her the willies, but dead bodies just flat out scared her. She had an unnatural fear that if she got to close it would start to move again.

"Two minutes," Lestrade told them.

"May need longer," Sherlock replied, the whole of his attention on the puzzle in front of him. John stood to the side with Jack, doing nothing. She briefly wondered why he came if he wasn't going to help.

He made quick work of the corpse. He gently touched her jacket and under the collar, examined her jewelry, and patted her pockets. He opened his mouth to tell Lestrade what he'd found, but wondered if Jack could do it just as efficiently as he could. He turned to her. "Jacqueline, come here."

She immediately looked uncomfortable. "What for?"

"I want to see what you can deduce from the body."

"How about, _no_?"

"Come now, she's _dead_. She's not going to bite you," Sherlock said impatiently.

Jack sighed and leaned forward with her arms folded, but made no move to come any closer. She began staring at the body.

"From over here," Sherlock demanded.

"I can do it just fine from where I am, thanks," Jack told him irately.

Sherlock sighed in annoyance. Why were people so squirmy about death?

"Well, I would guess that she was from Cardiff, um, only in town for one night or so."

"Cardiff? Why Cardiff?" Lestrade asked.

"She's wet," Jack answered. "And it didn't rain in London today."

"...Okay, but how do you know she was only here one night?"

"Her shoes. Why would you wear four-inch heels through rain unless you were going somewhere dry?"

"Shut up, Lestrade, don't interrupt her," Sherlock said.

"I'm done," she said. "What else is there?"

There was more, but he realized she wouldn't be able to tell because she couldn't see the woman's jewelry from over there. He resisted the urge to go over and drag the girl closer to the corpse, knowing Lestrade and John would stop him.

"Her earrings, bracelet, and necklace are all clean, but her wedding band is dirty. What does that tell you?" he persisted.

Jack scratched her head, uncomfortable with being put on the spot. "That she's not really happy in her marriage. What does the inside of the band look like?"

He pulled it off. "Clean."

"Then she takes it off and puts it on repetitively. Only adulterers do that."

Sherlock grinned. "Very good. Now come over here."

"No."

"Not for the body, for the floor next her hand," he clarified. "The note."

Jack slowly approached where he pointed, giving the body a wide berth. John felt sorry for the girl, forced to be where she was so obviously uncomfortable. He was going to say something, but she was already over there.

"_Rache_," she said with a perfect German accent. "Revenge. Though it's more likely that she died before she could scratch out the L in Rachel."

_Remarkable._ She had deduced everything he had, and from a distance. The girl had potential.

"But who's Rachel?" Lestrade asked.

"Is it not in her phone?" Jack asked.

"There isn't one."

She shook her head. "Yes, there is. What kind of adulterer doesn't have a phone?"

"Well, we checked the body and the purse, and it wasn't there."

"What about her case?" Jack asked. Sherlock was stymied; he had missed that.

"There was no case," Lestrade said, becoming the tiniest bit impatient.

"Look at the splash patterns on the back of her tights," Jack protested. "You get those kind of marks when you're dragging something behind you that has wheels through rain. There's a case _somewhere._"

"Oh," Sherlock breathed. "The case!" He stood and ran from the room. Everyone followed after a moment of confusion.

"Where are you going now?" John asked, following behind him.

"Come John, use your head. Pink! _Find Rachel_!" he shouted to Lestrade before zooming out of the building. John was quick to follow.

"Aren't you going to follow?" Lestrade asked Jack.

"I will; but first I need to use the bathroom," she answered. He pointed her in the direction of the loo and she went inside.

Outside, John and Sherlock ducked into the first cab they saw and Sherlock sent it west.

"Pink?" John asked.

"Yes, pink. Pink jacket, pink shoes, pink shirt, pink umbrella. The case and the phone will undoubtedly be pink too. We just have to find it."

"Where would that be?"

"Where her murderer could dispose of it without it being obvious. Think it through, John, and it's clear as anything."

"Right."

They were silent for about fifteen miles, and then-

"Sherlock?"

"Hmm?"

"Where's Jack?"


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: Thank you to all of my lovely reviewers! I just want to take a quick second here and let you all know a few things about the story. First, Sherlock does eventually get fiercely attached to Jack, but that's not the reason he doesn't emancipate her when they first meet. And secondly, of course Moriarty will be in this story (he's _only_ the most entertaining villain Sherlock has had so far.) I've tried to come up with a creative way to incorporate him in the story, so be on the lookout for his name!**

**Anyway, on with the show!**

"Un-fucking-be_lie_vable," Jack muttered, freezing her ass off on the corner. She had popped into the bathroom for ten seconds, and those two gits had left her. She knew from her extensive research on Sherlock that he was sociopathic and wasn't all that surprised, but she thought at least _John_ would remember her. Now she was stuck who knows where, it was freezing, and she had no cash for a cab.

That didn't necessarily mean she was out of options, she was just loathe to play that card.

Instead, she set off southwest, in the opposite direction the cab had taken them earlier. She remembered passing pubs and drugstores along the way, and when she found one she could get cash off her card and get a ride. Easy.

Sure enough, about ten or fifteen minutes later, she was in the middle of a small shopping area. She didn't see anywhere for her to get cash, so she continued on. She stopped at the corner of a street to wait for the light to change.

The phone in the phone booth next to her began to ring. She paid it no mind.

A few hundred meters later, the phone inside one of the drugstores rang. She was again waiting on the curb, and she watched as the cashier reached for the phone. It stopped ringing just before he could grab it.

The next time it happened, she was just about to pass the phone booth. It rang on as she watched, intrigued as to who could be trying so hard to get her attention. She wasn't stupid, she knew it was for her. She decided to indulge her curiosity.

She stepped inside the booth and answered the phone. "I have my own phone, you know," she simpered into the mouthpiece. "It's much more effective for getting my attention."

"Do you see the video cameras on the bank you just passed, Ms. Piper?" a voice asked.

She looked back at them in time to see them spiral away from her.

"And the one across the street?"

She watched them swivel and point in the opposite direction. Three more cameras were diverted from their paths and pointed away from where she was standing. She was invisible to all cameras within a four block radius.

She got the message.

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The building was dark and the ground was wet. Bright lights sitting on the ground cast enough light for her to see the man with the umbrella and a chair on the other side of the room. When she stepped out of the car, he made no move toward her. She walked toward him with adrenaline coursing through her, taking stock of all the available exits and planning to bludgeon the man with his umbrella if she had to.

He smiled at her when she approached, a smile that didn't quite touch his eyes. "Evening, Ms. Piper. So sorry to pull you out of town so indelicately."

"Hmmm. Any point in asking where I am right now?"

"Not much, but you may if you wish."

"I'm good."

He gestured to the chair. She shook her head. "No, thanks."

"You had a very long walk today, Ms. Piper. Surely your legs must be again, she shook her head.

"If I end up having to run from you, sir,she told him calmly, I'd rather already be on my feet."

He smirked at that, but internally the girl rose in his esteem. She was smart to ensure her safety. "I do hope I haven't frightened you."

"Forgive me, sir, but you're not very frightening."

He laughed. There was a trace of sarcasm in it. "How brave of you. Bravery is by far the kindest word for stupidity, don't you think?"

"I'd rather be stupid than arrogant," she told him quietly.

He frowned. "What is your connection to Sherlock Holmes?"

"Pending. At the moment I'd say we don't have a wrapped her arms around herself tightly. It was even colder here than it had been at the bloody crime scene.

"I'd hardly say it's nothing. You just met him this morning and you're already off solving crimes with him."

"If you already know that much, then you must know what we are to each other,she retorted.

The man smirked. "Sadly that part remains a mystery. An unimportant one, however. Do you plan to continue your association with Mr. Holmes?"

She just looked at him. "Who _are_ you?"

"An interested party."

"Interested in Sherlock? Why? You can't be his friend; he's not the type."

Eyebrows raised. "Not true. He has John."

"John is something else. I'd say he's more of a caretaker than a friend. So who are you?"

"He would call me his enemy. His arch enemy, in fact." The man rolled his eyes and scoffed. "He can be so dramatic."

"Oh, yes, why be dramatic about the man who's asking weird questions about you in an abandoned warehouse?"

The man's mouth twitched. "If you do intend to continue your relationship with him, I'd be happy to pay you a meaningful sum of money to help...ease your way."

Now it was Jack's turn to raise her eyebrows. If he thought she needed money, he _really_ didn't have a clue who she was. "In exchange for what?"

"Information. Nothing indiscreet, just... tell me what he's up to."

"Why?"

"I worry about him. Constantly."

Well that was obviously a lie. "Not interested."

"I haven't mentioned a figure."

"Doesn't matter."

"You're very loyal very quick, Ms. Piper."

"No, not loyalty. Just disinterested. Besides, I told you our relationship is pending. Could be nothing. If that becomes the case, I'd _hate_ to take your money and not be able to uphold my part of the bargain."

He could note the sarcasm in her voice and smiled wanly. "Very well. For various reasons, however, I would prefer it if my concern go...unmentioned."

"You got it. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go freeze on Baker turned and walked away. She was only a few steps away, though, when she stopped and turned back around. "For future reference, sir, you may want to watch out."

His eyebrows furrowed in a way that dared her to repeat herself. "I'm sorry?"

"Just as you have a vested interest in Sherlock Holmes, someone out there has a vested interest in me. They may not take kindly to being unable to locate me."

His eyes narrowed into slits. The British Government did not take kindly to being on the bad end of intimidation. "Are you _threatening_ me, Jacqueline?"

"No, sir. Just warning you. Next time you want to talk, just call me. Later."

She left him standing in the warehouse, chewing on that bit of information.

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She departed the car and returned to 221B Baker Street ten minutes later. Mrs. Hudson was surprised when she rang the doorbell.

"Hello, dear," she welcomed her, pulling her inside. Jack breathed a sigh of relief when the heat hit her.

"Hello, Mrs. Hudson."

"Why are you not with the boys?she asked.

"Complicated. Are they upstairs?"

Mrs. Hudson nodded and escorted her back up. "Jack's back, boys," she called ahead.

When Jack entered the flat, John breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank God."

Sherlock was laying on the couch covered in nicotine patches. "Told you she'd come back, John."

"Where _were_ you?" John demanded.

"Well, after I was oh-so-rudely left at a murder scene,she said accusingly, "I had to walk back."

Mrs. Hudson gasped. "You left a child alone at a crime scene? Sherlock, how naughty of you."

"_Goodbye_, Mrs. Hudson," Sherlock said from the couch. She went downstairs, tutting the whole way.

"It took you an hour and a half to find your way back?" John asked, guilt setting in hot and heavy. It was somewhat relieved when she laughed.

"No, I would've been here twenty minutes ago, but I was pulled into a conversation with one of Mr. Holmes' friends."

Sherlock's head snapped up. "Friend?"

"Well, enemy, he says."

Sherlock had no idea who she was talking about. _Enemy_ didn't narrow the field down at all. "Oh. Which one?"

"Doesn't matter,she replied. "I handled it."

John was concerned, but at the word 'handled', Sherlock lost all interest. "We're waiting on a text from the murderer," he told her.

"Scintillating." She leaned against a wall and closed her eyes. God, she was exhausted.

John noticed her discomfort and was quick to stand and offer his chair. He collapsed into Sherlock's chair, close to the fireplace. Jack burrowed into the cushions on the chair, taking advantage of John's leftover body heat. He realized for the first time that, while Jack was tall, she was the skinniest little thing he'd ever seen. She tucked her legs under her and his chair practically swallowed her.

"So how is he killing all these people?" John asked Sherlock after five minutes of quiet. "I still don't understand; how is it a murder if it looks like a suicide?"

"They're self administering poison, yes, but not because they want to,Sherlock answered. "The murderer is forcing them into taking a fatal poison. Why he's doing it is what we need to know, not how, John."

John's phone began to buzz. "That'll be our killer," Sherlock said. Neither one of them answered the phone, and Jack was fading in and out of sleep at this point.

"So what now?"

"Now we go find him," Sherlock answered. He stood and put on his coat.

"What, now? What about Jack?" John noticed the drowsy child was vacillating on the edge of sleep and was quick to throw a blanket over the girl's shoulders. She pulled it tighter around herself and hummed in appreciation.

"Look at her, she's fine,Sherlock argued. "She'll take a nap and still be here when we get back."

He left and John reluctantly followed him out.

Sherlock was half right; she was still there when they returned. And so were half a dozen cops.


	4. Chapter 4

**Enjoy!**

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She had been having a nice little doze when the front door of the flat had burst open and Lestrade, followed by six people she' vaguely recognized, waltzed in like they owned the place. She was jolted awake.

"Sorry, did I wake you?" Lestrade asked. He asked, but it seemed like he didn't really care that much. He pointed his officers in different directions, instructing them to search around the flat.

"What's going on?" she demanded groggily. Adrenaline pulsed through her, and protocol ran through her head. She pushed the thoughts away, not wanting Sherlock and John to come back to seven knocked-out coppers in their flat.

"Nothing to worry about," he told Jack. "It's a...drugs bust."

She blinked hard. She had no idea what to make of that. She watched silently from the chair as the officers rummaged through every drawer and cabinet. A woman in the kitchen stopped her search and leaned against the wall, looking at Jack with a mixture of awe and condescension.

"So, you're Sherlock Holmes' daughter, are you?" she asked. Jack vaguely recognized her from the crime scene; she was having an affair with the idiot in the corner. _Her name is Donovan, yes?_

"I think so, ma'am. He's verifying."

"That must not sit very well," Donovan said. "You show up and tell a man he's your father, you expect him to be excited."

"I don't mind that he's thorough, ma'am. I need him to be. If it turns out that he's not my dad and he signs my emancipation papers, it could come back to bite me in the ass."

Donovan chuckled and noticed for the first time that the girl was warily eyeing her from across the flat. "You look scared of me," she noted.

Jack nodded and simply said. "You have a gun."

"Yeah, we all do. What does that have to do with anything?"

"I don't like guns. I give all due respect to people who have guns. By the way," Jack continued, lowering her voice. "If you want this whole rough patch with your affair to go over, that's what he needs to give you."

Donovan didn't know which statement baffled her more, but she bristled at the mention of her secret affair with Anderson. She didn't have time to make a comeback, however, because the door slammed open and her favorite Freak strode inside.

John immediately strode over to his chair and asked Jack quietly if she was alright. Her discomfort was the first thing he'd picked up on when they'd entered the room.

"There's a _lot _of firepower in this room," she whispered.

"Guns make you nervous?" he asked. She nodded. "I'm sure it's fine; no one is pulling a gun on anyone."

"They might soon," she said, gesturing to Sherlock, who was yelling at the detective inspector.

"What do you think you're doing?" he yelled at Lestrade.

"It's a drug bust."

"I'm clean, Lestrade, you know that."

"Is your apartment? _All_ of it?"

Jack looked to Sherlock's face. He clenched his jaw and didn't deign that comment with an answer. He was good at hiding his emotions; not so adept at hiding drugs. She had been in the flat for less than three hours (two and a half of which were spent in a not-so-deep-sleep) and she knew of two hiding spots for his drugs already. There was cocaine in the expired cookies in the cupboard, and cigarettes in the fireplace. No morphine, though, which was strange.

"Lestrade, you have _no_ right-"

"Sherlock, _you_ have no right to withhold information. Now I'm letting you help out, but this is our case, understand? If you have any evidence we could use, we have the right to it. Now what have you done with her case?"

Sherlock gave him a blank look that fooled exactly zero people. "Oh, come off it," Lestrade exclaimed. "I knew you'd find the case. We're not stupid. Now either you give it to us or we keep looking."

"Are these eyeballs?!" Donovan exclaimed from the kitchen.

"Put those back!" Sherlock yelled. "It's an experiment!"

"They were in the microwave!"

Jack shuddered. How disgusting.

"Alright, _fine_!" Sherlock yelled, tossing his hands in the air. He stormed into his room and returned moments later with the case. Lestrade took it and laid it out on the floor, rummaging though the contents and aggravating Sherlock's organization.

Jack looked up at John. "Did you find him?" she asked under her breath.

"No, just destroyed a nice man's holiday," John said calmly. He noticed Sherlock watching them out of the corner of his eye.

"Ah. Did you at least enjoy your dinner?" she asked.

He quirked an eyebrow. "How did you-"

"Come on John, you _reek_ of Italian food," she said with a smile. He grinned back at her. He was beginning to like this girl.

"We found Rachel," Lestrade informed them. "She was Wilson's only daughter."

"Was?"

"Stillborn. 14 years ago."

Sherlock groaned in exasperation. This was getting him nowhere. "But that doesn't make any sense. Why would that be the last thing she thought of before she died? If you were dying, what would you say?"

John and Jack answered simultaneously, to everyone's surprise. "'Please God, let me live.'" They immediately looked at each other in shock. Donovan looked up from her perch in the kitchen. What the _hell_?

Sherlock didn't notice and scoffed. "Oh, come on, be more creative."

"I don't have to," John responded dangerously.

Sherlock faltered and John could see the regret in his eyes. Jack leaned over the edge of the chair and whispered, "I've been meaning to ask you about that. Were you injured in Afghanistan or Iraq?"

He chuckled quietly. His doubt was slowly fading that Jack wasn't Sherlock's daughter. "Afghanistan. How'd you know?"

"Your shoulder. It twitches slightly when you're excited. It's indicative of a former gunshot wound."

Sherlock watched their exchange for a beat before turning back toward the assembled cops. "Rachel must mean something."

"Maybe it's a password," Jack offered.

Sherlock turned to her slowly with limbs outstretched, a sure sign that he was onto something. "What did you say?"

"Maybe it's a password. I know a woman who used her sons' initials as her bank account password."

He took a breath. "Oh, clever girl. Perhaps that's exactly it."

He read the information tag on the case before leaping over to a laptop. He pulled the browser and typed a few words before shouting in victory. "It was her email password!"

"So we can read her email," Anderson scoffed. "So what?"

"Don't talk, Anderson, you lower the IQ of the whole street," Sherlock told him calmly. Anderson sputtered but couldn't think of anything to say in response. "If we can read her email, we can access her phone's GPS service and track it. And with it, the moves of her killer."

"Sorry, what?" Lestrade asked.

"Oh, yeah, we're almost certain the murderer has her phone," John said.

Lestrade bit his bottom lip and was obviously about to explode (what part of _not keeping evidence_ didn't these gits understand?!) when the laptop bleeped. Everyone looked toward it. Sherlock was reading the coordinates in disbelief when footsteps came up the stairs.

"Sherlock, there's a cab for you," Mrs. Hudson said, quite flustered at having so many policeman in her flat. Jack smirked at her. It would not bode well for Ms. Hudson for someone to discover the (rather impressive) stash of medicinal marijuana she had in her bathroom.

And suddenly he understood. How the people had all come to find themselves with a murderer. How a person could be unknown and still trusted. It was all so _clear_.

"Yes," he said slowly. "My cab."

He refreshed the browser so it would have to start searching over again and stood. "The computer is still searching. False location. If you'll excuse me."

He left in a swirl of dark curls and high collars. Jack looked at John.

"Yes, all the time," he said, answering her unanswered question. She smirked and glanced over at the computer while the police officers began rooting through the case. She paused when she realized the phone was right outside, slowly moving away from the building.

_It was in the cab._

The second she realized what was going on, her phone beeped. It was a text from an unknown number, which left her immediately worried. It was the only way they communicated with her, and she hadn't had any contact with them since she left.

**Follow him.**

She slowly shed her blanket and stood, stepping lightly back into the shoes she's taken off. "A friend of mine wants to meet with me," she told John. "I'll be back soon."

"Wha...right, yeah..." he muttered. She turned and left down the stairs, but halfway to the door her phone beeped again.

**Take the soldier. Make sure he has his gun.**

She stuck her head back in the flat and got John's attention. "Actually, could you come with me?"


	5. Chapter 5

**Have I updated this week? If I have to ask, I probably didn't -_-. Anyway, here you go! I hope you like it. The story's coming along well; I'm almost fifty pages into it, making it the longest fanfiction I've ever written. I have no idea how many chapters I have.**

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"So here's the truth of it," Jack said when they were on the sidewalk. "I lied, there is no friend, but Sherlock is in trouble, and I need your help." She tapped on her phone with a speed that reminded John of Sherlock when he was frantic.

John did a double take. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, the phone was in the cab. Sherlock got into the cab with the murderer, and now we have to go find him. If we don't he could be in trouble." It was something they obviously didn't think he could handle on his own; otherwise, why would they be sending her after him? "Do you have your gun?"

"Yes. Wait, Jack, slow down. First of all, how do you know Sherlock is in trouble?" John asked with his hands in the air.

"How can a person get into a cab with a crazy murderer and _not_ be in trouble?" Jack countered. She raised a hand in the air like she was in class, not stepping out into the street, not even looking up from her phone, and two cabs pulled up. John wondered how the hell she had done that.

"Where are we going?" John asked. They climbed into the closest one and buckled in.

"I don't know," Jack answered, handing it to him. She had pulled up Jennifer Wilson's email and was tracking the phone, which was heading northeast. "But we'll find him."

The pair gave the driver street by street directions, explaining apologetically that they knew how to get where they were going but didn't know the final address. The cabbie was understanding, but then, he worked for Jack's benefactors, a fact that John did not know. They followed the cabbie through a serpentine route that ended at a tall, Gothic style school building. It was the sort of structure used by colleges. Jack sent John inside to find Sherlock while she 'paid the cabbie'.

"Be quick, ma'am," the bedraggled cabbie told her. "They went inside ten minutes ago and no one has emerged yet."

"I will," she said, noting the parked cab outside the front of the building. After shaking the man's hand, she ran across the street and into one of the side doors.

She found John quickly, staring through one of the windows. "That bloody idiot," he hissed.

Jack looked through and saw Sherlock with a plump middle aged cabbie with a cheap sweater and a tacky hat across the building. They were talking to each other, and there were two bottles on the table between them with one pill each inside. Presumably, this was the bottle with poison in it. She watched as they each chose a bottle and her heart leapt into her throat. He was going to do it, wasn't he?

Her phone beeped. **Shoot him.**

"Give me your gun," she ordered John.

"Yeah, that's not happening," he told her. No way in hell was he giving a fifteen year old a gun.

"John, in about twelve seconds, Sherlock is going to take that damn pill and I may lose my father forever, if he _is_ my father. The gun. Now."

"Absolutely not."

She sighed again. "Don't make me take it from you." It sounded not like a threat, but more like a plea not to waster her time.

John raised his eyebrows at her. "Jack, I'm a soldier. I highly doubt-"

He was cut off by her launching herself at him. He dodged her assault, which was what she wanted; she used her heel and wrapped it around his foot, yanking it up and pulling him down. Before he touched the ground, she grabbed his sweater and pulled him back up, reaching under him to pull the gun from his waistband. Once she had the gun by the handle, she let him go, and he dropped on his back with enough force to knock the wind out of him.

"You may be a soldier," Jack told him. "But I'm a graduate of something much greater."

She calmly cocked, took aim, and fired.

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"He's going to think it was you," Jack told him later, standing with him outside while the police took care of the scene. "All the evidence is going to point toward someone with a high capacity for violence and training as a fighter, neither of which he thinks I have."

"Great," John said warily, rubbing his neck. "Now he'll think I'm a crazed murderer."

"If it's any consolation, he won't be put off by it," she told him. She was hoping for at least a chuckle, but all she got was a cold dark look. She'd expected him to turn against her, but she was disappointed all the same. She had started to like him.

"I really am sorry, John," she told him quietly. "Sorry that I laid you out like that. But I had to do something."

"Sure."

They were quiet for a moment before she said, "He can't know it was me."

"I won't tell him."

"Thank you."

"Interesting contradiction you've got going on there," John sneered scathingly. "You're terrified of guns but shoot one like a Black Op."

"It's complicated, but let's just say it was required of me to learn. The fact that it bothers me wasn't anticipated."

He scoffed and rolled his eyes. Even more silence followed. Jack sighed and decided to lay it all on the line. "I know you hate me now and everything, but if everything goes according to planned, we'll never have to see each other again. For what it's worth, it was a pleasure meeting you."

He opened his mouth to correct the girl- he was upset, sure, but he certainly didn't _hat_e her- when Sherlock approached him.

"Sargent Donovan has just been explaining everything to us," John said quickly. "Two pills? Dreadful. Dreadful business, isn't it?"

Sherlock hummed in agreement. "Good shot."

After a pause, John stammered, "Yes, yes, it would have to be. Through that window."

Sherlock took another half step toward him and whispered, "you'll need to get the powder burns off your fingers. I doubt you'll go to jail for this, but let's avoid the court case."

John saw Jack surreptitiously wiping her hands on her jeans. The two of them began to walk away, Jack lagging behind.

"Are you alright? You have just killed a man," Sherlock asked John. John made a joke about the cabbie deserving it for being horrible at his job, and the two of them laughed. Jack read the message she'd just gotten.

**Nicely done. Acquire your own gun for the future. **

She put her phone away and jogged a bit to catch up to the two men. Sherlock was mentioning getting Chinese food when his phone rang. He saw that it was Molly and turned away.

They didn't talk for long; Molly said her piece and was promptly hung up on. He turned to say something to Jack, but she wasn't looking at him. She was looking at the man across the way getting out of a car. His presence filled her with a sense of foreboding.

"It's that guy again," she said to Sherlock. "The one I met this afternoon."

At the sight of the man Sherlock visibly bristled. "I know exactly who that is."

He stalked up to him in annoyance. John and Jack followed. "What are you doing here?"

"I was concerned about you, as per usual," the man answered.

"Yes, I've been hearing about your con_cern_," Sherlock hissed. The man glanced at Jack and smirked; he wasn't surprised that she'd said something. John had too, at the beginning.

"Always so aggressive. Did it ever occur to you that we belong on the same side?"

"Oddly enough, _no_."

"This petty feud between us is childish. People will suffer. And you know how it always upset _Mummy_."

Jack's face twisted into confusion as Sherlock said, "_I _upset her? It wasn't _me_ that upset her, _Mycroft_."

"Hang on, wait," Jack interjected. "_Mummy_?"

"Yes, mother, our mother. This is my brother, Mycroft. The British Government, when he's not busy being the British Secret Service or the CIA on a freelance basis."

On the inside Jack was reeling. She knew that Sherlock had a brother, but didn't concern herself with details about him. If she had, she would've recognized the name _Mycroft_. He owned half the political capitol of the world.

Why she had been chosen for release was suddenly starting to make a _lot_ of sense.

Mycroft regarded her with vague disinterest. "And the child? What is she to you, Sherlock?"

"Who, Jacqueline?" he said theatrically, pulling her close. "Why, Jacqueline happens to be my daughter. And if you don't mind, we're going to get dinner. Goodbye, Mycroft. Try not to start a war; you know what it does to the traffic."

Mycroft's eyes opened in shock at the word 'daughter'. He watched in disbelief as Sherlock wrapped his arm around the child and pulled her away. John followed behind.

Jack looked up at Sherlock. "It's official, then?"

"It is."

"What exactly did Molly say?" John asked.

Sherlock smirked at him. "'Congratulations.'"

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Jack slept on their couch that night, despite John's protests for her to use his bed. The next morning, Jack and Sherlock spoke in the living room over tea. John had somehow found the time to buy biscuits the day before, so the three of them enjoyed a quick morning snack of tea and biscuits before Jack and Sherlock moved into the living room. John decided to clean the kitchen (a job that should've been done weeks ago) and keep an ear on the Holmes' conversation.

"Your mother was Mary-Lynn Piper," Sherlock murmured, shuffling through the papers she had brought.

"Yes."

"Where have you been living for the last fifteen years?"

"On a commune," she answered.

"And you and your- wait, sorry, what?" he stumbled.

She blinked at him. "What?"

"You lived on a commune?" Well, that was strange.

"Yep."

"And Mary Lynn lived with you?"

"Yes and no."

"Okay, what does _that_ mean?" he grouched.

She sighed. "It's kind of hard to explain. Does it even really matter?"

"Well of _course_ it matters. Explain." John strained his ears extra hard to hear what she had to say.

She rolled her eyes. It _didn't_ matter- this was about Sherlock's unrelenting desire to know everything in the universe. Her words rolled around in her head like a Boggle game, trying to put themselves together in a way that would make sense. She didn't find one. It didn't really matter; the truth was just _weird_, no matter what order she put it in. So she took another long drag of her tea before putting it down and facing him. No better way to tell him than to just say it, right?

"I never _technically_ lived with Mom. I was born and raised by my benefactors on a commune with thirty other kids."

The entire backstory Sherlock had created for this girl cracked and shattered. "_What_?"

"I lived in a communal-living facility with thirty other kids for my entire life. But it wasn't an orphanage," she added.

Was that not the definition of an orphanage? "In what way was it not?" he asked her.

"None of us were up for adoption."

"So why were you there?"

She sighed. "It's difficult to explain why in a manner that makes sense. Basically, everyone there was a child that had been carried for nine months by a surrogate. The surrogates were impregnated through in-vitro with specimens from a sperm donor, or in this case, you."

It _vaguely_ made sense, Sherlock contemplated. Surrogates banding together and building a community; stranger things had happened. He hummed, examining the papers again. "So why did this Mary-Lynn Piper choose my specimens?"

"...She didn't. It was...well, commissioned."

Sherlock's head rose again to meet Jack's eyes; she looked slightly uncomfortable."I'm sorry?"

She picked at the thread hanging off the couch pillow she was hugging to her chest. "All the children were commissioned. That's what it was there for. People paid for specific children to be born."

"And someone specifically chose for this woman to use my DNA?"

"Yes." _That_ aspect of the commune was something she was allowed to share with him. From this point on, however, she'd have to lie.

"So do I have other children?"

"No. Only one child per sample, that was the rule. After the surrogate is pregnant, the specimens are destroyed."

"Why?"

"I don't know. It was never explained to us."

He scratched his head and glanced back down at the papers. "Who 'commissioned' you?"

"I don't know for sure; all I do know is that it was a woman."

"Why would someone chose _me_ specifically?"

Jack shrugged. "Your looks? There were a lot of kids there who were bred to have a certain appearance."

This was beginning to sound more and more bizarre. "Where was this commune?"

"Australia."

"Then how did you get a Scottish accent?"

"We're taught to mimic all the accents, to help us blend in better no matter where we go. Scotland was the last place I was before I came here. That reminds me." She took another long swallow of her tea and sighed. "Better?"

All of the sudden her accent was 100% British. He was vaguely impressed. And also wondering what sort of place taught children to mimic accents with 100% accuracy.

"Your mother was thirty-one when she died. What did she die of?"

"Three bullets."

John dropped his plate in the soapy water in surprise. Sherlock looked at Jack closely to gauge her reaction, but she started at him with a blank face. She kept her face so smooth it was unnatural, even to Sherlock. He added another trait to his internal list of deductions- she was an expert at masking her emotions. He suspected, however, that she had experienced great emotional turmoil over the loss of her mother and was still upset about it.

Sherlock looked back down at the papers and thought. Every field had been completed; all that remained was his signature and Jacqueline would be a fully emancipated citizen of London.

And he didn't want that.

There was a mystery to be solved here. This commune she'd grown up on where children were _commissioned_- it was exactly the kind of case he needed right now. He wanted to know who had paid Mary-Lynn Piper to have his child and why. He wanted to see this commune, where children were bred but never adopted. He wanted to know why each specimen was only good for one child.

If he let her go, he'd never find out. And he _had_ to find out.

He capped the pen and put it back on the table. "Where are you staying right now?"

"With an associate of my benefactors. Why?"

"We'll need to pick up your belongings. We have another spare room upstairs that's being used as storage, but I can take my things out and move them to the basement."

John looked out into the living room, stunned. He wasn't doing what he thought he was doing, was he?

"A mattress and bed frame can be easily procured, but you'll be on your own for bedsheets and the like. I don't know what you'd prefer; best to not risk it. I'll look into educational-"

"Wait, wait," she said, becoming alarmed. This was not the talk of a man who was about to sign emancipation papers. "What are you doing?"

"Figuring out where to put you. Obviously."

"...but why? If you sign my emancipation forms, I can live in an apartment. I've already got it arranged. It's fine, Sherlock, really, you don't have to do this."

"I know I don't _have_ to. But me not raising my own child? My mother would die." He knew she understood why he was reticent to let her go, so he only said it for John's benefit. He went for the plate of biscuits, realized there were none, and wandered into the kitchen looking for more. John stepped out of his way and glanced at Jack, slightly apprehensive of the girl's rising anger.

"I think you'll find that I've been thoroughly raised," Jack said hotly, standing and facing the kitchen.

"Is that a fact?" he murmured rifling through the pantry. He found a biscuit and edged out of the kitchen, but instead of going back into the living room, he turned the corner and went into his room.

"Seriously. You're not going to sign the papers?" she cried.

"I'm not going to sign the papers!"

"You're making a mistake!" she yelled after him.

"I'll buy you that bed this afternoon!"

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John waited twenty minutes before trying to converse with Jack. He had originally wanted to make his move after ten, but he had taken a step out of the kitchen when Sherlock swept past and left the apartment. She stared after him, awestruck. "He's _actually _going to buying a mattress."

Her shock was even more concerning, since he didn't know when it would give way to fury, so he stepped back into the kitchen.

Ten minutes later, Jack was sitting on the couch, staring ahead with a vapidness that made John wary. He still left the kitchen and walked over to her. For all her ferocity, he was legitimately concerned about her. She looked really upset. "Jack?"

"I don't understand," she told him. "Why isn't he trying to get me _out_?"

"What do you mean?"

"I did my research well, John. Sherlock doesn't care about anyone. Ever. Except maybe you."

John accepted that comment with a twitch of his eyebrow. "Sherlock cares about people, Jack. He cares about you."

She scoffed. "Is that what you _really_ think? That he wants to take me in because he looked at me and his heart grew three sizes? Wake up, John! He just wants to figure out what the deal is with the commune I was raised on."

"Why exactly is that a bad thing?"

She bit her lip, reluctant to share with him. John already had the secret that she was a badass; if she told him what she suspected, it would only deepen the rift between him and Sherlock. Besides, she didn't know if she had cause to be upset yet. She needed to dig deeper, talk to more people.

She tossed her hands up in renunciation. "Nothing. Never mind, I'll be out soon enough." She pulled on her shoes and grabbed her coat off the rack.

"Where are you going?" John asked, concerned. It would do no good to have the girl out drop-kicking London in her anger.

"To get my shit from my place. _Apparently_, I'm moving in."


	6. Chapter 6

**I'll give you guys this next chapter as an Easter gift! College is seriously kicking my ass right now, so I'm a chapter behind. My classes end in 20 days or so, but I wouldn't expect an update until at least May. **

**I was so worried that I would lose everyone when I explained where Jack came from. Glad to see you're all still hanging in!**

Two weeks went by. The bed was delivered and put into the spare room, along with all of Jack's belongings. She conceded to the whole thing with poor grace, stomping around and throwing her clothes on the floor. It became apparent to John quite quickly that Jack's plan was irritate the two flatmates until they evicted her.

Within the two weeks that had passed, everything had become covered with _Jack_. There were socks on the floor of the stairs, there were jackets laid on the sofa, magazines and paint on every flat surface, bras on the shower rod, and hair care products on the sill of the fireplace.

But the kicker, in John's opinion, was the rabbit.

Jack had a white, Dwarf Hotot rabbit sitting on the countertop in the kitchen. When he turned the corner that morning, Jack was feeding it a carrot and gently stroking its head.

"Does no one care that we _eat _in this kitchen?" he snapped.

She scoffed. "Please. You eat in those lounge chairs. There's a soy sauce stain in the shape of Africa on that cushion."

"That's not- fine, fine. Whatever. How long have you had the rabbit in the flat?"

"About twenty minutes. My friend was watching her for me, and she just got dropped off."

"Sherlock's not going to like that."

"Sherlock can kiss my ass."

The door past the kitchen opened and the man in question swept in wearing his robe. "John, have you seen my-"

He stopped talking abruptly. John didn't need to turn around to see Sherlock's face. He was sure the look on his own face was mirrored on his flatmate's; nose crinkled in disdain, mouth twisted, confusion at the fact that a rabbit was sitting on his countertop.

"What is _that_?" he asked.

Sherlock received a cold glare from Jack. "_She_ is Sparrow, and it would do you well to refer to her as such."

Oh good lord. She named an animal after _another_ animal. That was not going to fly well with Sherlock, John knew.

"Sparrow? You named a rabbit after a bird? _Why_?" Sherlock walked into the kitchen and looked at Jack like she had lost her mind.

She gave him the same look back. "You don't get it?"

"Get what? Is that supposed to be humorous?"

She rolled her eyes and pointed at herself. "Jack." She pointed at the rabbit. "Sparrow."

John got it and snorted a laugh, moving past Sherlock to get to the fridge. "Cute."

"What?" Sherlock asked, oblivious. Jack raised her eyebrows at him.

"Jack Sparrow? You've never heard of Jack Sparrow?"

"No,who is that?"

Jack scoffed and turned back to Sparrow, feeding her another carrot. "Only the baddest pirate to ever captain the Black Pearl."

Jack had her back turned, so she didn't see, but John saw the way Sherlock's head whipped up and his body froze. "Pirate?" he questioned.

"Yeah, I have an unhealthy thing for pirates," she replied. "She was either going to be Anne Bonny or Grace O' Malley, but then _Pirates of the Caribbean_ came out and Johnny Depp made a _veeeeeery_ convincing case for Jack Sparrow."

Sherlock stared at Jack with an unfamiliar expression on his face. John watched Sherlock, curious at his flatmate's reaction. Sherlock's stare was unyielding until Jack picked Sparrow up off the counter and turned back to the men.

"What?" she demanded.

"Nothing," he murmured. He shook his head a bit to shake himself out of his fog. "Nevertheless, I do not allow _vermin_ in my home. The rabbit will not be allowed to stay."

"That's fine by me. My emancipation papers are on the desk," she said simply.

John sighed, anticipating an argument. The two of them had been arguing profusely about everything, from the state of the mess in the flat to Jack's excessively loud music, and all the arguments started the same way. Ended the same way, too.

"I'm not _emancipating_ you, Jacqueline," Sherlock growled.

"Well, then, Sparrow isn't leaving."

"I'm sorry, did you hear me ask for your opinion? I am telling you, the rabbit is not staying."

Jack put Sparrow on the counter so she could put her hands on her hips. John took a healthy step back.

"Did you hear me ask if Sparrow could stay? I'm telling _you_, she's not going anywhere."

Sherlock sputtered like a beached fish. "E-you-ex_cuse_ me?"

She rolled her eyes. "You heard me. Just because some _test_ says that you're my father doesn't mean you get to start telling me what to do. I've had Sparrow for two and half years. If I decide to give her up, it won't be because _you_ told me to."

Veins in Sherlock's neck started to stick out. His normally pale face was drawing enough blood to give him a human-colored complexion. John couldn't help but laugh.

Sherlock whirled on him. "You are not _helping_."

"Well, now you know what it's like to be met with unrelenting stubbornness," John told him gleefully. Jack smirked at him and picked Sparrow back up.

"You can't have the rabbit," Sherlock told her. "It's leaving my flat."

"If she's going anywhere, she's going to the cage in my room," Jack told him. She then flipped her hair over her shoulder and stalked past him with Sparrow safely tucked under her arm. Sherlock blinked and turned to John with an awestruck expression.

"Can you believe her?" he asked his blogger.

"Sherlock, I can't believe _you_," John told him honestly. "You can't just tell her to get rid of her pet; she's had it for longer than she's known you."

"She is blatantly disobeying me."

"She's a teenager. They rebel against their parents. It's what they do. What did you think would happen when you took her in?"

"I thought at least she would listen to me. I had no idea she was going to be so bloody _difficult_."

"Am I interrupting?"

Sherlock and John turned around to see Mycroft coming into the side entrance to the kitchen. Sherlock scoffed and walked away.

"Jack and Sherlock are having a bit of a rough afternoon," John informed him.

"Don't bother with the backstory, John, he already _knows_," Sherlock snapped.

John looked at Mycroft's face. The telltale arch of his eyebrow told John that yes, he did already know. John made a mental footnote to look into finding those cameras once more.

Footfalls sounded from the corridor, and Jack came back into the living room. Sherlock pulled himself to his full height and readied himself for Round Two, but Jack completely turned her back on him and turned to Mycroft. "Oh. You're that guy."

"Your uncle," Mycroft corrected.

"Right. Hello."

"Afternoon."

Sherlock's mouth dropped open at the slight. He was not only being ignored, but being ignored for Mycroft? He huffed and plopped on the couch to sulk.

"Can I get you some tea, Mycroft?" John asked.

"That would be lovely, thank you."

The only noise in the flat came from John making tea in the kitchen. The three Holmeses were silent. Mycroft twirled his umbrella around and examined the tip of it, studiously avoiding Sherlock's silent rage from the living room. Jack stared at him with unabashed curiosity, deducing what she could about Mycroft before he next spoke. What she saw surprised her slightly.

After two minutes of silence, Sherlock snapped. "Isn't there an election for you to be rigging right now, Mycroft?"

"Sherlock," John warned, handing Mycroft the mug of tea. Mycroft made a face; Jack guessed it was because there wasn't finer china.

"It's quite alright, John. I merely came to meet my niece. Formally, this time," he said with just the tiniest bit of chagrin.

She smirked at that. "Thanks for that; I could do without the ominous black car this time."

He said nothing about her new accent. He'd known all along that it was put on. Mycroft's eyes flitted from Jack's head all the way down to her feet. "Well. It seems that you've been having a trying day, haven't you?" He took a long drag of his tea and waited expectatly.

"_So_ trying," Jack bemoaned. "Sherlock is being so _rude_ to Sparrow."

"Yes, well, not everyone understands the allure of the rabbit, now do they?"

She looked at him curiously. "Should I ask how you knew Sparrow was a rabbit?"

"He's got the place bugged," John replied. Mycroft didn't deny it.

Jack made a sound of understanding. "Okay. I was _wondering_ about the camera in the mask."

Mycroft froze. Sherlock glanced at him before flying off the couch and ripping the mask off the wall. A small black camera with a colorful array of wires greeted him. He immediately set out ripping them out and stepping on the webcam.

Mycroft sighed. "Excellent. I shall have to replace that." He glanced at Jack, curious and a bit impressed. "How did you notice that was there?"

"I grew up being monitored. I know what to look for."

"Your previous home sounds like a rather interesting residence. I would so love to hear more about it."

"I was under the impression that you had the British Government under your thumb," Jack replied lightly, walking past and picking up one of her art supply magazines. She knew he was fishing for information, and if he was going to get it, it sure as hell wasn't going to come from her. "Why don't you let the good men and women of MI6 earn their money?"

He shifted. "I'd prefer to learn such data in a more traditional way. I've found that I tend to give people the wrong impression when I arrive with their life's history tucked into a file."

She studied him for a long moment before a gloating smile overtook her face. "You didn't find a single thing, did you?"

He didn't respond. She smirked. "My benefactors are quite careful. If you can find anything on them, I'll be quite surprised."

He scowled and observed Jack as she flipped through the magazine, earmarking certain pages as she went. After he texted Anthea to dig deeper, he observed the flat and turned back to his niece.

"You paint."

"Brilliant deduction."

"What is your artistic focus?"

She looked up at him curiously. Was this another fishing expedition? Jack didn't see how learning about her art was going to help him uncover her secrets. And she couldn't imagine that he was actually interested.

Still, she answered. "Mostly skies and abstractions. Lately, however, I've taken to trying my hand at realism."

"Do you have a favorite artist?"

"At the moment, I'm following the works of Zaria Forman. She renders portraits of icebergs out of pastels that look like photographs."

"Hmm. That sounds quite impressive."

Sherlock looked up from where he was throwing away the decimated camera pieces and glared at his brother. "Oh for God's _sake_, Mycroft."

Mycroft looked surprised. "What?"

"You actually _like_ her, don't you?"

His tone was so disdainful that Jack narrowed her eyes at him. "Well, _thanks_."

"Whatever do you mean?" Mycroft sniffed.

"All your talk about wanting to get to know her better; you really meant all of that."

Mycroft blinked at him. "Well of course I'm pleased-"

"Not just pleased, you're _elated_. I can tell from the way you're silently cataloging all her possessions- you're over the moon at the fact that you're an uncle. You want her to _like_ you. _And, _you're thinking about buying her a _present_."

Sherlock finished his deductions with a sneer. No one spoke for a moment. Mycroft measured his brother's mood with his Holmes senses and decided that maybe he should leave.

"Jacqueline, would you be so kind as to accompany me to lunch?" he asked. He put the mug on the table. "I doubt my brother is going to be very hospitable for the remainder of our conversation."

"Absolutely not," Sherlock answered immediately. "I'm her father, and I say no."

"I'd love to go to lunch," Jack said to Mycroft, stepping in between them and showing Sherlock her back.

Sherlock clenched his fists as Jack picked her threadbare jacket up off the couch and threaded her arms through it. She had a particular talent for finding his buttons and pushing them aggressively. "I said no."

"You did, and as I believe you learned from our earlier discussion, you don't get to make decisions for me."

"Jacqueline, you are being deliberately trying."

"You're treating me like a child."

Sherlock's temper piqued. "You _are_ a child-"

"_See_," Jack sneered, rounding on Sherlock, "I'm _really_ not."

John and Mycroft exchanged a glance, guessing from Jack's tone that Sherlock had just touched a frayed nerve.

She continued. "A _child_ needs to be taught right from wrong. A _child_ needs to be supported by their parents. A _child_ can't choose for themselves. _I _am self-sufficient._ I_ am responsible. You denying me emancipation doesn't automatically make me a child. In the eyes of the law I may be your dependent, but in every way that matters, I am an adult. You _will _acknowledge me like one or you will not acknowledge me _at all_."

Somewhere through her rant she realized she was yelling. She took a deep breath to calm her obviously strummed nerves. Sherlock was silent, his eyebrows up high at her diatribe. She ran both hands through her hair and took another deep breath. When she let it out, she looked at Sherlock with a semblance of calm on her face.

"Now. I'm going to go to lunch with your brother. And if Sparrow is missing when I come back, so help me God, there will be hell to pay."

He sputtered some more. "Are you _threatenin_g me?"

"I'm _warning_ you." She narrowed her eyes at Sherlock to punctuate her point and left the flat. Mycroft, with a head-tip in both directions, followed her out.

Sherlock stared after them, flabbergasted. Jack had officially lived here for no more than a few weeks and already her stuff was everywhere, she'd brought an animal into their home, and then she'd left with _Mycroft_. Out of everything they'd done to each other, this one cut him the deepest. _Why Mycroft_?

John opened his mouth to inform him that this was what teenagers did, but he was interrupted by Sherlock's phone buzzing. After a sharp, irritated breath, Sherlock picked it up and checked his messages.

"Lestrade?" John guessed.

"Dimmock, actually," Sherlock corrected. "It hardly matters. There's been a very strange murder at a local park. Autopsy reveals that a severe knife wound killed him, but the he died in front of many witnesses from the park who swear no one touched him. We're needed."

"What about Jack?" John asked as they moved to the door.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "She'll be fine. She's got _Mycroft_."

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Mycroft gestured to the sleek black car in front of them and a man sprung from the front to open their doors. Arms around her shoulders, Jack gratefully climbed into the warmth of the vehicle. Mycroft followed behind, eyeing her carefully. She said nothing and stared out the window vapidly.

"Are you alright?" he asked when they were two blocks away from Baker Street.

She blinked and looked over at him in confusion. "Yes?" She made it sound like a question.

"You seem agitated."

She sighed. "I am very mature for my age," she told him. "I have never been treated like a child by those who knew me, and I don't appreciate being treated like one now. Sherlock thought that by taking me in, he would automatically become an authority figure to me. He's just going to have to learn that that's not the way it works."

"And who exactly are _those who knew you_?" Mycroft asked. "Not your mother, obviously."

"No, not just her." But she didn't elaborate.

Twenty minutes in, she noticed two motorcycles behind them and a car in front of them that had been there for most of the drive. She recognized a tail when she saw one."We're being followed," she told him.

He chuckled. "Not as covert as they seem to think they are. We'll have to work on that."

She attributed his nonchalance to the fact that they were most likely his secret service. Still, she was uneasy about the disassembled sniper rifles she knew the motorcyclists had in their bags.

When they got to the restaurant, Jack moved to her door, but Mycroft had put a hand on her arm and shook his head. Seconds later, the door on his side was opened and he turned and slid out. She had rolled her eyes and followed. Mannerisms were great and all, but she could've been out of the car much faster if he'd let her do it herself.

The maitre d was there, greeting Mycroft and telling him in rapid French that his table had been procured. Mycroft's table turned out to be a private setting on a hidden third balcony that overlooked the entire restaurant. The second they sat down, waiters appeared out of the woodwork to fill glasses with water, hand Mycroft a scotch, light a few candles, hand Jack the menu, and replace the flowers in the vase.

When they were gone, she glanced up at her uncle. He was looking her over with shrewd eyes that she knew were reading her life story in her face.

"What are you thinking?" he asked suddenly.

She smirked and looked back at the menu. "That you're either the prime minister or the man in the shadows who makes the decisions for the prime minister. 'Minor government official' just doesn't cut it anymore."

He chuckled at that and took another sip of his scotch. Jack glanced at the menu for a moment longer before setting it down. She wasn't really hungry, anyway; she'd had Chinese just yesterday.

"I wouldn't have taken you for the familial type," she said, idly playing with her straw.

He shrugged lightly. "Not so. I simply wish to make an opinion of you for myself."

She knew he was lying. Sherlock was right; she could tell by the way he kept looking at her that he was secretly overjoyed to discover he had a niece. She wondered if there was a way to twist that to her advantage.

"I must ask you, though I fear I know the answer; has Sherlock mentioned you to our parents at all?"

Ah, yes, the Holmes seniors. Jack knew plenty about them from her research; they lived in a monolithic mansion that reeked of old money in one of the older parts of London. Their father was a retired army general but their mother had never worked, choosing instead to exercise in society and prestige. And despite what many thought, (and what Sherlock perpetuated,) they loved both of their children very very much.

"Not to my knowledge," she told him.

"Then no. If he had, they would've already appeared."

She titled her head in thought. "Why wouldn't he tell them about me?"

"Because they'll come to meet you, I suppose," he answered. "Sherlock has very little patience for mediocracy, and our parents are as mundane as it gets. Don't get the wrong idea, we care for our parents immensely; but an afternoon spent with them is a dull afternoon indeed."

Jack smirked. Mycroft and Sherlock were both idiots, plain and simple. When their parents were gone, they would wish they had spent more 'dull' afternoons in their parents company. She would know.

Mycroft ordered a steak and she opted for a cup of soup. He made a face at her and said, "I do sincerely hope you do not share my brother's appetite; his lack of eating is troublesome for his health."

She smirked at him and sat up taller. "Why do you think I'm so skinny?"

"I'd attributed it to your athletic prowess," he told her.

"You think I'm athletic?"

"Your upper arm and calfs muscles are those of someone with physical training. I noticed them the first time we met."

"I took yoga back home," she lied effortlessly. Yoga had been part of her regimen, but it had not been the only physical activity she participated in. The other 'sports', as they were, were not appropriate for polite conversation.

"I see. Were you often stressed at home?"

She laughed gleefully. "Watching you try to figure this out is going to be a _treat_."


End file.
